Reply #16: Your little -- primary a president and he will lose does not work at all

[JDPriestly]

if you look at history.

Presidents who are unpopular with a large enough portion of their base lose.

Those particular presidents often face either a primary challenge or a third party challenge.

And they inevitably lose.

Lyndon B. Johnson was the most professional vote-counter that has ever sat in the White House.

He lost the support of a good portion of his party -- and did not even dare to run. He read the tea leaves (uh, the newspapers showing his activists were not with him).

Carter was a one-term president. One crisis after another divided his party. And he was challenged. What came first, losing the support of a good chunk of his base or the primary? I think that the loss of support encouraged Kennedy to challenge him.

George H.W. Bush raised taxes and supported the idea of free trade. In addition, the economy was weak during his administration, and he was perceived as too liberal on social issues and criticized for not "finishing the job" in Iraq. He lost the support of much of his base. He was not primaried but faced a strong third party challenge in the general election.

Clinton managed to bamboozle his base into thinking he was on their side. He also benefited from a robust economy. At the end of his presidency, a small but significant enough minority of his party broke off to support Nader -- who waged a third party challenge to Gore, Clinton's vice president.

George W. Bush kept his bloodthirsty base satiated with his wars and boogeyman rhetoric. They stuck with him through his second term (although he may have cheated a bit both in 2000 and 2004).

Obama has lost a good hunk of his base. He would have to work a miracle to get it back.

Obama may win in 2012, but he will do it without his base. The only strategy that will work is for him to forge what would essentially be a whole brand new third party made up of traditionalists in the Republican Party and the conservatives in the Democratic Party.

In any event, we old-fashioned Democrats will be left to form a new Democratic Party. I don't think Obama can run as a Democrat and attract the business-oriented but not Tea-Party Republicans. And that seems to me to be the only way he can win. It could be that Obama will break off from the Democratic Party for 2012. It's just a possibility, not a prediction. But that Obama will regain the support of the traditional Democratic base -- no, I don't think so.

And remember, presidents who are not supported by their base don't win. That's actually what the history shows you.